Which child was the hardest to add to your family?

[Veritaserum]

So the thread addressed to moms with large families got me thinking. I always heard that once you have three, more is no big deal. It was not true for me. Four was harder than three. Five was astonishingly more difficult than four. I don't think we're going to have any more. Five was a lot harder for my sister as well. We seem to be in the minority.

[Parrothead]

Well, since I only have one additions don't count. Adding dd to just dh and I was easy. I wasn't one of those moms that stayed home with the baby the first 6 months. If I (or we) had to go somewhere I just packed dd up and took her with me.

[Amber in AUS]

I put other. Adding #1 was terribly difficult, she was also a difficult baby, i stopped working, life was crazy. Adding #2 was also difficult but for different reasons, my time was split and it was difficult to go places with 2 babies, DD was only 18mo when DS came along. Adding #3 was easy. Adding #4 was a train wreck. Spending so much time away from my family was horrible! But now that he is home it has been an easy transition for our family, so if it weren't for his long hospital stay i think it would have been easy to add #4.

[amy g.]

5 has been harder than 4, but that may just be because I am old, old, old.

[lapsetmom]

My memory may be failing me, but it sure seemed difficult having my first! Going from no extra responsibilities to the new experience of parenthood was not easy for me. She was my most difficult, and I chalk it all up to my inexperience with parenthood. I am preparing to add number six, and I don't really expect too much difference. I have some big helpers now, and I am much more comfortable with parenthood.

[coffeegal]

So the thread addressed to moms with large families got me thinking. I always heard that once you have three, more is no big deal. It was not true for me. Four was harder than three. Five was astonishingly more difficult than four. I don't think we're going to have any more. Five was a lot harder for my sister as well. We seem to be in the minority.

 

:iagree: 5 was so much more difficult. I thought it was because I was older, and it was a challenge to return to baby mode. We'd reached the point where everyone could tie their shoes, no diapers, buckle their seatbelts... heck everyone could even read!

[dakarimom5]

Amy G. and I have the same number of years between our first and last :). With that much space it was easy to add one more. Heck I'm trying to have another just to spice things up...LOL!!

[Kalypso]

#5 was the hardest for me. She wasn't an easy baby and it took me 4 years to feel ready for another. #6 was a breeze even though I was 40.

[Dinsfamily]

Well, I'm pretty happy to see no one's picked 4 yet!

 

Everyone kept telling me that the third was going to be the hardest but it's been pretty easy. My oldest has been very helpful which is nice. Also, the older two became a unit leaving dh and I with either the youngest or the older boys. Pretty easy transition.

 

#1 was the doozy for us. Thankfully, he was/is a very easy-going dc. It took a long time to adjust the how much time and energy parenting takes.

[Unicorn.]

I voted other, because 2 and 3 were added at the same time. Ds was 25 months when the girls were born. It was definitely harder to go anywhere or do anything. I had 3 kids, but only 2 hands. Dh was working 16-18 hr days back then. They are the reason we didn't go for #4. We were afraid if we got pg again, I would have triplets or something. :lol:

 

Just to clarify, there is nothing wrong w/ triplets. I was just out of hands.

[Mom-2-7]

I chose other. For us, kids 1 - 7 were easy. Yes, the work load increased but it didn't seem to matter. There are 13 years between kid 2 and kid 3.

Kids 8 and 9 were hard. They came to us through adoption and they were older (age 4 and 6). They had lots of emotional and behavioral issues that took a huge toll on our family. It's been a little more than a year now and things are starting to get easier with one of them. The other is still a challenge. The work load also seemed to explode with these last two also. I think we are finally done.

[AngelBee]

Going from one to two was very difficult for me.

 

Now I have 7! :D

[----]

#3 was the hardest to add. Ds is actually the easiest going of all our dc, but when he came along Dd#2 was at the top of her temper tantrum throwing stage. I just didn't have enough hands or patience.

[EmmaNZ]

Number 4 is a huge slog for me at the moment. (Mine are 6, 4, 2 and 8 months). It is getting easier again, but having the others was no trouble and this has been TOTALLY EXHAUSTING! Not put off yet though.......!!!!!:tongue_smilie:

[Michelle O. in MO]

Well I feel like a wimp, but adding #2 was the hardest for me. I was so exhausted all the time that ds babyhood is one big fog to me. He was an excellent sleeper, but when he was awake he wanted no one except his mama. I never felt fully recovered to have another baby. The truth came 6 years later when they told me my thyroid had tanked. I had thought those huge chunks of hair falling out were the normal challenges of a new baby, hormones adjusting after childbirth, and toddler at home. :glare: Nope.

[cjzimmer1]

#1 was by far the hardest but he was such a high maintenance baby and has continued to be high maintenance at every stage since. It's his personality that made/makes him so difficult rather than the adding a baby to the family. I would say #3 was the second hardest but she is my 2nd most challenging child. She is just always in your face. The rest were all a piece of cake to add but they all have very laid back temperments. They've all showed their personalities almost from birth (even though I didn't realize it at the time) and that really has been the predictor for us on whether it would be a harder one to add to the family or an easier one.

[Sara in AZ]

I'm only 2 weeks into this, but I vote for #4. Mostly it's because the youngest two are closer than #2 and #3 were (two years versus almost 4.) Plus the older two are involved in a lot more activities now and have more schoolwork to do. And so far the baby only sleeps if she's being held....

[AnitaMcC]

We are a "special" situation.

 

We had our twins first... that was an adjustment but it went well IMO.

 

When twins were 3yrs old... we gained custody of my then 11yr old niece and 9yr old nephew.

I was also pregnant with Ds#2. He was born 7 months after niece and nephew moved in. I think he was the one who sort of tipped my sanity to insanity-LOL.

 

He was walking at 9 months and running by 10months. He was into everything, and everything was game for him. He was able to bypass every baby proofed product I installed. He did more "damage" than twins did combined. Ds#2 stopped taking naps (unless I could nap with him) at 18 months and I was pregnant with Ds#3 by then.

 

So, I guess it was my 3rd child who I gave birth to, but he was the 5th child into the family. Maybe it was because we went from two preschoolers to 5 kids in 7 months. Not really enough time for adjustment.

Edited February 8, 2011 by AnitaMcC

[Celia]

I'm saying the first, but only because he was a really colicky one, who had lots of difficulties in many areas. Plus my MIL had died during the pregnancy from a brain tumor in a span of 5months, and all the stress had our marraige on the rocks!

 

The next one was added through adoption as a toddler, and I had a bout of post-adoption depression, which was rough. It was a tricky adjustment.

 

The third cried a lot in the evenings, but compared to the previous infant I experienced who cried pretty much all day and never slept more than 45mins, he was just an angel!

 

My vote was so much about the disposition of my child. Had my 3rd been as difficult of an infant as my first, I would have picked 3rd. But if they had both been easy babies, I'd say the second would have been the hardest, simply because of how she joined our family!

[Forget-Me-Not]

#1 was hard just because it was a complete lifestyle shift for me. I went from working full time to SAH full time. Once I adjusted, it wasn't so bad. He was an EASY baby.

 

I voted that #2 was the hardest to add, but some of that probably had to do with #2's personality. She was a high-needs, demanding, fussy baby who did. not. sleep. unless she was on one of us. She didn't nap, even as a very small infant, and she had a very short list of people who were 'allowed' to hold her. There were days I didn't think I'd survive her infancy. Things got better when she became mobile and especially verbal. She was a much easier toddler than she was a baby, and she and #1 became best buddies and began to entertain each other. There were days I only saw them because I checked in on them and fed them once in a while. They'd hole up in a bedroom and play all. day. long. So I thought, hey, this isn't too bad, why don't we do this a 3rd time?

 

#3 was easier in some ways to add because I was already used to juggling, and because #1 and #2 are such good buddies, they sort of occupied each other and that freed me up a lot to tend to #3. But she's been a crazy active toddler, and at the moment she's driving me (and everyone else) batty because she's either into something she's not supposed to be into or she's endlessly pestering her older siblings (or me, relentlessly, for candy).

 

Will there be a #4? Depends on the day you ask me. . . :lol: Some days I think I'll miss having a baby or a toddler around, but #3 is walking, talking, feeding herself and thisclose to potty-training, and there are other days when the thought of starting all over again with a newborn makes me physically ill.

[Britomart]

I voted "other" because adding #3 and #4 at the same time was harder than either of the others one at a time.

[littleWMN]

I have 4 kids:

 

DD1 - 2nd hardest transition, 1st hardest baby

 

DD2 - Easist transition, easiest baby (adopted)

 

DD3 - Hardest transition, easy baby (adopted, only 10.5 months younger than DD2)

 

DS4 - Once my horrid pregnancy was over, this was also an easy transition, 2nd hardest baby

 

What makes #3 the hardest is that she is 10.5 months younger than my 2nd DD, so they were both babies at first. Then she had developmental issues so I couldn't really combine them in much. It was just rough. Plus my oldest was 4 and not a very good 4. The next year after this was very easy.

[extendedforecast]

#5 is kicking my rear. She is a good baby, a happy baby, but I just can't seem to juggle her needs, the 2yo's needs, the household duties, and my older children's needs. I'm really struggling these days.

[Lisa in the UP of MI]

Adding number one wasn't too bad. We had the normal adjustment to becoming parents and many sleepless nights, but she was a pretty easy going baby and I continued to go to school part time until she was 8 months old, giving me a feeling of normalcy.

 

Number 2 was the hardest by far. Not only was I trying to figure out how to split my time and energy between two kids, but ds was a cranky high needs little guy. Even now, he is still my hardest child.

 

Number three came sweet. She was a newborn for about a week. By one month she was ready to hop off the floor and play with her siblings (of course she couldn't quite yet). She was also high needs, but she wasn't so negative like her brother. The toughest part of adding her was ds adjusting to not having mom's almost full attention. We adjusted well at first, it was harder mid-year, and things became very easy by the time she turned one.

 

Number four is such an easy-going guy. The initial transition was very easy. I was totally prepared, down to having a menu of easy-to-make and home-made frozen dinners for a whole month. By 6 months things were much more difficult, mostly due to the middle two kids. Number three was really leaning on me to keep her emotions in check and it was pretty rough when she didn't get a huge chunk of my energy anymore. The baby, though, is still pretty easy going at 12 months.

 

Even though things are a little crazy around here we'll probably have more some day. We have talked a little about adopting but we'll probably have one or more biological children first, God willing.

[Green Vixen]

I voted "other" because I also added #2 and #3 at the same time :001_smile:! My oldest was 22 months old when my twins were born and it was crazy!!!

 

Marisa

[Peela]

I think #1 was a huge, life changing event, but relatively easy for various reasons, probably the main one being that she was a very easy baby and i was just ready for motherhood and it felt very natural for me. I thoroughly enjoyed myself and her.

 

#2 came hard on the heels of #1 though (17.5 months apart) and my body, while still young, didn't handle it so well in retrospect (my hair went straight and stringy for quite a while), our living situation was different and I felt very isolated, I tandem breastfed and for a while didn't get any support for that (but I don't regret it), and he was a difficult baby with colic and an angry temperament. So he was definitely the more difficult of the 2.

 

Often people have easier 2nd babies because they are better at the mothering thing by then, but it didn't work like that for me.

 

I would have had more kids- at least one more- but dh already has an older dd and didn't want more.

He has an autistic sister still in the care of his elderly mother and one of his main concerns was getting a disabled child. He wanted to stop while we were ahead.

[Sophie]

Baby 1 was difficult...WOW! I didn't have any experience what so ever. I didn't even know how to hold a baby, or change a nappy. He had allergies, and was crying all the time. I'm so glad he was my first. Baby 2 was soooo easy compared to baby 1. I'm confident that when Baby 3 arrives we'll be fine. Even when it's a crying baby again. Just pop him/her in a sling and go on with everyday life. Thank God for babycarriers! :D

[Ravin]

I voted other, because 2 and 3 were added at the same time. Ds was 25 months when the girls were born. It was definitely harder to go anywhere or do anything. I had 3 kids, but only 2 hands. Dh was working 16-18 hr days back then. They are the reason we didn't go for #4. We were afraid if we got pg again, I would have triplets or something. :lol:

 

Just to clarify, there is nothing wrong w/ triplets. I was just out of hands.

 

My mom used to joke that she stopped after my sisters because she could see the math. First she had one girl, then twin girls. She was sure if she did it again she'd wind up with triplets, and they'd all be girls. :tongue_smilie:

 

As for me, ask me in six months.

[Carrie12345]

So the thread addressed to moms with large families got me thinking. I always heard that once you have three, more is no big deal. It was not true for me. Four was harder than three. Five was astonishingly more difficult than four. I don't think we're going to have any more. Five was a lot harder for my sister as well. We seem to be in the minority.

 

#3 was hard, but I'm finding #5 even more difficult. He's just a very high needs baby, and I'm struggling to get anything done.

 

#4 was a cinch for me, so I find the current situation shocking!

[justamouse]

I didn't have a four-I went from three to five.

 

That being said, 1 was the hardest.

[Carrie12345]

My mom used to joke that she stopped after my sisters because she could see the math. First she had one girl, then twin girls. She was sure if she did it again she'd wind up with triplets, and they'd all be girls. :tongue_smilie:

 

As for me, ask me in six months.

 

I was actually very good friends with a girl whose family was made up of a singleton, twins (which she was one of), then triplets! I don't know how they managed! The gaps were about 2 years and 5 years, so I suppose it could have been even crazier.

[Mommee & Baba]

I voted 3. But only because it takes a village to raise him on a daily basis. LOL!

 

#2 was challenging but with #3 I have 2 school-aged kids and finding the time, patience and energy to enjoy their company when I've been cleaning up and chasing a very curious toddler has been the BIGGEST challenge! I feel like I'm so absorbed in cleaning up, chasing and entertaining him that my older 2 suffer and have to wait til I have no energy left to get ANY time with me besides school related. So thankful dh has been making a huge effort to take the totboy and the girls and I hang out without him doing things we typically couldn't do with him without frustration and fits.

[BikeBookBread]

We only have two. The first was a blissful, life changing event that filled my world with wonderment :001_tt1: I couldn't find a blissful ignorance smilie.

 

Number two was just as wonderful, but she ROCKED PDG's perfect little self-centric world, sending reverberations through our family still felt today. :lol:

[Princess Peach]

I picked #3. I was pretty good with doing two things at once when #3 came along. I couldn't do 3 things at once and I felt that someone was always waiting for me to do something. This also probably has to do with the fact that #3 was born when #1 was not quite 4 yo and #2 was 13 mos old.

 

I have to say, though, that now it's a piece of cake. I just tell them to get it themselves! :D

[....]

Kid #2 - without a doubt. :lol:

[Joyofsixreboot]

Number 3. I had a 3yo, 18 mo old and a newborn. I think it took me a year to get my head above water.

[Soror]

#1 so far, #2 and #3 have been so easy by comparison. Of course figuring out the food issues is really what helped as ds never slept, unless held, and always cried. I guess we will see how the others go!

[happypamama]

I guess I've had fairly easy babies, because I haven't thought adding any of them was particularly difficult, just more people to get ready and out the door and more laundry. #1 was a very easy baby, and our lives didn't change much when she arrived; if we wanted to go somewhere, we just brought her along. She was always happy if there was something new to see, new people to admire her, etc. While not difficult, exactly, I guess #2 was the biggest change (but he was an easy baby who was happy as long as Mommy was holding him, plus my oldest is very independent); I think with the second child, you really make the switch from "couple with child" to "family." You're more conspicuous at a fancy restaurant, for instance, but that might be that you have a toddler (and in my case, that easy first baby turned into a whirlwind active toddler, who is still like that) and not specifically that you have two children. Or when you go somewhere as a family, each parent now gets a child out of the car. Stuff like that.

 

By the time #3 came along, #2 was over 3 1/2 and had grown up a lot; six months earlier he was still very young for his age, and the transition would have been harder on him. Instead, he was ready to be the big brother, so that really helped make the leap to three easier on me. I was already used to splitting my attention between two children, so three hasn't been that different, just that it takes longer to do anything.

 

Now, four, otoh, might be my breaking point. My #3 is still going to be pretty little, the smallest gap we've had so far, so I don't know how that's going to be for us. I guess we'll see in a few months. :)

[NanceXToo]

I voted 3- but I only HAVE 3 so far. And the reason I picked 3 was that my son was a VERY demanding baby- like he wanted to be held and nursed pretty much constantly and cried whenever I put him down, never napped, took forever to sleep through the night (like, he was still waking up MULTIPLE times a night up until he was at least 15 months old), and so on. My daughter was only 5 and saying things like "you used to hold ME on your lap..." it was very exhausting for quite a while there! But now that they're older, it's pretty easy going most of the time and I'm looking forward to (hoping to!) add number 4 at some point in the near future. :D

[5forMe]

:iagree: 5 was so much more difficult. I thought it was because I was older, and it was a challenge to return to baby mode. We'd reached the point where everyone could tie their shoes, no diapers, buckle their seatbelts... heck everyone could even read!

 

 

:iagree: This is the same thing that happened to me. I often daydream about giving this little one a sibling to grow up with since he is much younger than the others, but I am so overwhelmed at the moment, I think it might put me over the edge.

[Renee in NC]

It wasn't the particular number of children for me. The hardest for me was #6 because then I had 4 children 5 and under! Compared to that, #7 was a breeze.

 

ETA: If I would had my first 4 in 5 years, then that 4th one would have been hardest. However, most of my babies have been pretty easy. I've never had many sleepless nights. Babies are easy - it was trying to take care of the preschoolers while nursing baby that was hard. In addition, my 9yo was the oldest of those 4, so I had a 5yo who functioned on about a 3yo level and had significant issues to deal with as well.

Edited February 8, 2011 by Renee in FL

[BlsdMama]

I clicked #5 though he was technically #6, Hannah had already passed so I was juggling only four others at the time.

 

Tim was born eleven months after Rebecca, so I suspect that made him a bit of a unique circumstance. :)

[Lolly]

Going from 1 to 3 was very difficult. #1 wasn't 2yo yet when the twins came along. Now, it is great having them so close together!!!

[Kimberly in IN]

I voted #1 b/c he was the first, becoming parents for the first time, etc. And, he came early, spent time in NICU, was part of a triple pkge - lost the other 2 at separate times in the pregnancy, etc. But, after having 1, my motto became "what's one more?" HOWEVER, we only have 4, can't speak to adding more than 4 children to family.

[texasmama]

Four was much harder than three for me, too, in those early years. However, she was born with a birth defect and some health issues, didn't sleep through the night until she was 2 1/2, and I had many other issues/factors pulling at me at the time so I'm sure this contributed. Now that she is five years old, I don't think it is much more trouble at all to have four than three. I sat at home a lot with her and missed the other kids' activlites until last year when she was more able to sit. I didn't enjoy that season at all and am so glad it is over.

[mom2bee]

Removed by the Author.

[Sarah CB]

I voted other because the third was the most difficult to add during the early years, but I'm finding that having four is much harder than having three.

 

Third child was born when second was not quite two. I found that the closeness in ages was very, very difficult. My toddler still needed to be held and carried and yet I had a newborn as well. I had a very hard time balancing the needs of the boys during those first couple of years.

 

When I had the fourth it was wonderful! All the other kids could make their own lunch, get their own shoes on, etc. I really got to enjoy the baby. I loved having the time to just hold him and play with him. And the other kids really enjoyed him, too.

 

It was as the fourth got older that things became difficult. I found homeschooling more difficult - everything was multiplied *and* I had a busy toddler. Even now I find it very hard to meet the needs of all four of the kids. Each one of them needs so much time and it's hard to find it. I wish I had more hours in my day, but I don't.

[Kim in Appalachia]

close in age. They are 20 months apart. To make it harder my 3rd child was a difficult baby, he cried all the time. My 2nd child, though a sweet infant, was a nightmare as a toddler. She is was constantly into to trouble. The combination made it a hard year. My 4th and 5th seemed easy after that combo. :001_smile:

[nukeswife]

For me 2 was definitely the hardest. My first was such and easy going child, he just loved to "Be" and it made it so easy to be a first time mom. My dh did have some travel time which took him away for about 3 months time, but ds and I always had a groove from day 1 so it was easy. I was really ready to have #2 when she came and if she wouldn't have been such a Daddy's girl it wouldn't have been so hard. Compared to her older brother (she was born the day before he turned 2.5 years old) she was a needy baby. She always needed attention, was never content to play by herself and more than anything loved her Daddy and wanted him more than me no matter what. Dh was at a Shore duty billet at the time but had some really long work hours which made for some really long hair pulling type days. We always knew we wanted at least 3, so we just waited a little longer to try for #3, when he came along (my oldest was 6years 2 months old and my dd was 3 years 8 months old) it was such and easy addition. My dh was actually on deployment when he was born (he returned home 1 week later), but it was still much easier to add #3 than his older sister. Once again I had an easy going baby, who just loved to "be" We moved from WI to VA when he was 2 weeks old and it never phased him. He's by no means a lump sitting child, he loves to play and is always on the go, but was more than content to play by himself if he had things to play with. We didn't start homeschooling until after he came along (he was about 1 when we started schooling his big brother who had been in PS for a short time) and it was never really hard to do because he was so happy to play while we schooled. At the same time as starting to HS my dh deployed again, so it was just me and the 3 kids, still not nearly as hard as my dd's first 3 years of life, when dh was around more than he was gone. My boys were always used to dad being gone, but my dd was spoiled with daddy being home more than he was out at sea. My dd is still needy, although not as much as she used to be, but she doesn't often want to do things on her own, where as her brothers have no trouble finding something to keep them busy.

 

So for me adding #3 was a walk in the park compared to adding #2

[FloridaLisa]

but because of his personality, not because of adding a fourth baby. He was high needs and grumpy and I was so, so glad I was home full-time with him so that I knew he was getting Cadilac care.

 

HTH,

Lisa